Hello everyone, I hope you’re well. I usual it’s another ...
Hello everyone, I hope you’re well. I usual it’s another scorching hot with more humiliating humidity in central Florida. I found these on one of my milkweed plants. At first, I thought there were egg clusters from possibly a monarch butterfly so I didn’t disturb them. However, I’ve been noticing they have not been making any kind of change at all. I identified them. These are Oleander aphids. Tiny little yellow/orange bugs with black legs. I just doused them with a Neem oil. I made a positive identification through three separate apps. Here’s is my favorite app I’ll share here. It will help identify almost any bugs you find in your garden. It’s a very useful tool. https://thebugidentifier.com/insect-identifier/ 🌱🪻🌸🌳🌸 🪻🪴🌳🌸🐝 #HappyPlants #PlantsMakePeopleHappy #PlantAddict #NewGrowth #OutdoorGrowing #TheWateringHole @HFplantoasis @HummingbirdMint @Idplantthat @ILoveMyPlants @Jadedbelle @Jujube @Luckeecharm1 @ModestCoconut13 @Ms.Persnickety @newplantgirlies @Preciousplants1 @princesspitstop @QuickKalopanax @sarah10orio @Shells_Garden @SillyPlantGirl @SizableSuncup20 @smushface @SolaceInSunshine @RefinedSandwort @Ponytailmom @Blhagmaier @BigPetunia80 @BEsucculent @UnbeatenSoybean @TopCoriander6 @stephongreg @ILoveMyPlants @SpyderLily @Ms.Persnickety @CutePolypremum @DreamMachine @ILoveMyPlants @MariansOasis @SillyPlantGirl @Tiffanypickles @4eva @ @NOLAPhoenix @Devsleafypals #Greggang #TheWateringHole
21
Best Answer
I agree with Nadia on this companion planting and hard removal.
I NEVER use neem oil outdoors. Plants just wither and die no matter how much protection you try to give them.
Companion planting is the way to go. Marigold are always my top choice for all bugs that are nests. They are a farmer's best friend. I plant seeds right along with my veggies. The only pest I get occasionally is hornworms. (Easily treat with BT). Which doesn't hurt beneficial. BT only works on worms though.
Oleander Aphids release a toxin called cardiac glycosides, so they don't taste very good to the beneficial insects. Since they feed on milkweed they taste bad. Even if you added beneficial insects like ladybugs, 🐞 they would probably not eat them unfortunately.
The garlic spray homemade from garlic (easily made) does work as a deterrent, but it will also deter any beneficial insects.
My favorite thing is beneficial plants, they attract pollinaters and deter pests with their fragrant scents.
If you go to any Lowes or Home Depot even Walmart you can pick up a flat for cheap and plant them now.
Other choices for specifically Oleander Aphids are:
Fennel
Dill
Sweet Alyssum
Basil
Mint
However, in the heat of summer all of the above herbs bolt really fast. After they bolt they die. So they wouldn't be worth your time. I grow all of these in the cooler months. I have some that are still growing but it takes constant work of trimming flowers before they start. I spend like 3 hours in my veggie garden daily. Pruning, picking etc.
Marigolds you can plant and forget they will just keep flowing and working for you even when it's very hot.
@DreamMachine
I NEVER use neem oil outdoors. Plants just wither and die no matter how much protection you try to give them.
Companion planting is the way to go. Marigold are always my top choice for all bugs that are nests. They are a farmer's best friend. I plant seeds right along with my veggies. The only pest I get occasionally is hornworms. (Easily treat with BT). Which doesn't hurt beneficial. BT only works on worms though.
Oleander Aphids release a toxin called cardiac glycosides, so they don't taste very good to the beneficial insects. Since they feed on milkweed they taste bad. Even if you added beneficial insects like ladybugs, 🐞 they would probably not eat them unfortunately.
The garlic spray homemade from garlic (easily made) does work as a deterrent, but it will also deter any beneficial insects.
My favorite thing is beneficial plants, they attract pollinaters and deter pests with their fragrant scents.
If you go to any Lowes or Home Depot even Walmart you can pick up a flat for cheap and plant them now.
Other choices for specifically Oleander Aphids are:
Fennel
Dill
Sweet Alyssum
Basil
Mint
However, in the heat of summer all of the above herbs bolt really fast. After they bolt they die. So they wouldn't be worth your time. I grow all of these in the cooler months. I have some that are still growing but it takes constant work of trimming flowers before they start. I spend like 3 hours in my veggie garden daily. Pruning, picking etc.
Marigolds you can plant and forget they will just keep flowing and working for you even when it's very hot.
@DreamMachine
@SillyPlantGirl , I wasn’t sure if they were monarch butterfly eggs or the eggs from some other pollinator. They have been there for a few days and I’ve noticed no change at all in them. Of course that raised a red flag. I took a photo and identified it on three different websites they all came up with the same thing. One of the sites said they have little black legs so I pulled some off the plants and took a look at them, sure enough. They are now becoming part of history. 
@ILoveMyPlants , hi Deb yes I washed my hands good but first I smooshed a few in my fingers. They smelled like the plants who they sucking sap out of. I learned quite a bit from this episode.
@SillyPlantGirl , I am very familiar with fire ant Catherine. Oh, I find them totally repulsive and painful. Once I stepped into a nest of them barefoot with both feet I had over 60 bites just a few seconds. I couldn’t wash them all for the Their mounds are distinctive the dirt is Gray.
@SillyPlantGirl , A few years ago I hiked in a cypress Cypress swamp with just flops on. For months in the cooler weather I have been hiking through there with no problem. Then I didn’t go out there for about six months and hiked again. The chiggers ate me alive. I literally had over 300 chigger bites. That was even worse than the fire ants. It itched so badly it kept me up at night.  I have posted a few photos from there.
@SillyPlantGirl @Malagueña I had a fire ant infestation in my bedroom when I first moved into this house 8 years ago. I would wake up to find them crawling on me, have scars all over my body 😭😭 I now have a legit phobia 🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️😓😣
@SpyderLily @Malagueña I am allergic to ants and bees so I run when I see those awful ants. When I was in the army in training, we sat down for lunch (mre’s in the field), and I, unfortunately sat on an ant mound that nobody saw. It was so bad the instructors had to strip my uniform, and get me to the hospital. Over 200 bites and I had trouble breathing. This is before and after pics of my Asiatic Lillie’s 🤬🥲🥲
@SillyPlantGirl How did you get into the army with a bee allergy?? My fiancé was automatically disqualified for a bee allergy that he doesn't even have. 🙄 He got stung in the face when he was little and Nana rushed him to the hospital and it was recorded as an allergy. 🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️ The funniest part is that he's a freaking apiarist now 😂😂 He's probably been stung thousands of times since he started his first hive 🤣
I never knew I was allergic until I was already in. Besides that- I broke my neck in basic training on my 18th birthday- I stayed in for 8 years after (the bee and ants came age basic training). Yeah they tried telling me I was pregnant and weren’t going to let me in. I thought- gee I could be really famous for getting pregnant when I haven’t had sex. At all! 😳🫣
@Malagueña Hi Bob! I’m guessing these are the reason you were asking about insecticidal soap? 😏 I see how high the stakes are…you want these pests gone but it would be horrible to do damage to any monarch, or their eggs or caterpillars. While I would usually recommend beneficial insects like lacewing or ladybug 🐞 larvae for aphids, unfortunately they would also eat monarch eggs or baby caterpillars. 🐛 😔
The safest method you have is hand-removing and squishing like you did, or trying to blast them off with a spray of water (after first checking whether or not you have monarchs of any form in that area.
In the future, I would recommend companion planting…alliums like onions, chives, and garlic, or marigold don’t smell good to aphids and should help keep them away from the milkweed. None of those plants will repel the monarchs. I’ve also, in the past, planted “sacrificial plants,” (my own term) ie plants I know aphids LOVE, that are intended to lure them away from a special plant. But, oleander aphids feed primarily on plants in the dogbane family Apocynaceae, so I don’t know if planting other plants in the dogbane family would help lure them away from the milkweed or just attract MORE oleander aphids 🤔 🙃. Tagging @SuperbRaspfern in case she has any other advice for you! Yarrow attracts beneficial insects like hover flies whose larvae are quite good at eating lots of aphids…but they will sometimes accidentally eat small monarch caterpillars too…
The safest method you have is hand-removing and squishing like you did, or trying to blast them off with a spray of water (after first checking whether or not you have monarchs of any form in that area.
In the future, I would recommend companion planting…alliums like onions, chives, and garlic, or marigold don’t smell good to aphids and should help keep them away from the milkweed. None of those plants will repel the monarchs. I’ve also, in the past, planted “sacrificial plants,” (my own term) ie plants I know aphids LOVE, that are intended to lure them away from a special plant. But, oleander aphids feed primarily on plants in the dogbane family Apocynaceae, so I don’t know if planting other plants in the dogbane family would help lure them away from the milkweed or just attract MORE oleander aphids 🤔 🙃. Tagging @SuperbRaspfern in case she has any other advice for you! Yarrow attracts beneficial insects like hover flies whose larvae are quite good at eating lots of aphids…but they will sometimes accidentally eat small monarch caterpillars too…
@Malagueña
https://youtu.be/zx2W7cDxcJ4?si=ROohqpYVY4ez7boy
Use this garlic spray here, that and just Castile soap spray to wash them before any ants start helping the aphids. I had the same aphids on my milkweed so treating them promptly is important be sure to keep spraying even when most of them are gone as to kill any leftover eggs
Hope that helps
https://youtu.be/zx2W7cDxcJ4?si=ROohqpYVY4ez7boy
Use this garlic spray here, that and just Castile soap spray to wash them before any ants start helping the aphids. I had the same aphids on my milkweed so treating them promptly is important be sure to keep spraying even when most of them are gone as to kill any leftover eggs
Hope that helps
@DreamMachine, Hi Nadia. Thank you for taking so much time to answer my question. I think the only thing I’m going to do is just get a damp rag and pull them all off and squish them.
A few of my companion plants hard at work. Zinnias also work (they are in the first photo) but not for oleander aphids. The straw help keep my soil cool in 100+ degree temps. This garden in in full South facing sun.
Personally, I also love to see the splash of color mixed in so it's a win-win. I don't even deadhead the marigolds. They get no attention ever. @DreamMachine
Personally, I also love to see the splash of color mixed in so it's a win-win. I don't even deadhead the marigolds. They get no attention ever. @DreamMachine
@SuperbRaspfern thank you so much! Your garden looks like such a pleasant place to be (except for the 100° temps aiyiyi!! 😅)
I hope Bob doesn’t mind if I slightly hijack his post to ask you a quick question 🙏
I just got a rhipsalis sulcata, another jungle type cactus, and I’m in love 😍 Unfortunately he came with a bit of root rot, but nothing too bad. After I’m finished treating him and get him potted up, do i treat him like a regular cactus/succulent and hold off watering for 9-10 days to let his roots recover? Or give him a bit? (2nd pic example of what the remaining roots look like)
I hope Bob doesn’t mind if I slightly hijack his post to ask you a quick question 🙏
I just got a rhipsalis sulcata, another jungle type cactus, and I’m in love 😍 Unfortunately he came with a bit of root rot, but nothing too bad. After I’m finished treating him and get him potted up, do i treat him like a regular cactus/succulent and hold off watering for 9-10 days to let his roots recover? Or give him a bit? (2nd pic example of what the remaining roots look like)
I love those, I have 4 varieties. They like more water. They do best with consistent watering otherwise they dry up. So go ahead an water a little after planting. Not a ton, just enough to moisten the soil so it doesn't fall right out of the pot. It will go into shock after its treatment so go easy on the watering until she has settled in. @DreamMachine
Also these are SUPER easy to propagate. I occassionally know a tip off mine because I tend to be a bit rough on my plants. If it happens to you, just let the end seal over to dry for a week, 2 weeks if it's on high humidity. Then plant it. They grow new roots really fast. Then you can have more of them to make a nice full pot. The cut stem just form another offset from the node. The node are all the bumpy areas with little hairs. The node is called an areole for these cacti. I have one that is taking over a window! I'll take a picture to share later. Right now I'm snuggling with the pups.
@SuperbRaspfern oooh awesome! Thank you for the tips 🥰 I love how different they are from any of my other plants. Yes, I noticed roots growing at different spots along the stem 🙌 I just LOVE how the stems have those alternating sections! It’s so very interesting to look at, and very satisfying to hold while I’ve been treating them.
What other varieties do you have? Is there a favorite of yours? I was also eyeing 👀 a Rhipsalis baccifera ‘Oasis’ 😍
Give the pups a scritch from me! 😊
What other varieties do you have? Is there a favorite of yours? I was also eyeing 👀 a Rhipsalis baccifera ‘Oasis’ 😍
Give the pups a scritch from me! 😊